Post Office Bay
Iguanas
Cruise
First things first, can I just say that OMG I love, and I mean love, LOVE, the Galapagos. It's definitely pure paradise. I could have happily spent an additional week cruising around the northern islands. As it was, I was privileged to spend five idyllic days sailing on a boat, aptly called Darwin, with 15 people who have over the past 5 months have been like a second family to me.
Our time at the Galapagos was jam packed, brimming with daily activities and places to explore. Each morning we awoke to a delicious breakfast and it was usually followed by a tour of one of the southern islands. Afternoons tended to involve snorkelling with amazing sea life. I'm definitely getting more comfortable with water, but then it is very easy when you can swim with playful sea lions, turtles, rays, white tipped sharks, huge shoals of fish - the list is endless. Here is a video that Francois created using his underwater camera; it gives a wee sample of the amazing stuff we saw (but he did a different trip and saw hammerheads, the lucky sod)
It is quite surreal to snorkel in the sea have someone yell 'shark' and instead of the normal, sane, reaction of swimming as far away from the crier as possible (or making every effort to get out of the water), you actually find yourself swimming as hard and fast as possible towards the point in question. I did, briefly, have the sense to call this action into question, but worryingly found myself uncontrollably drawn towards the commotion.
Sadly we did not spot any hammerhead sharks during our trip, but they are not indigenous to the islands we were visiting. Still, I made do with seeing numerous white tipped reef sharks. There was even one occasion where I came across a shark being chased in full flight by an aggressive sea lion, quite a sight to see. It is strange to discover the amazing world that exists under the water. It really is spectacular, and snorkelling is an awesome way of getting a brief glimpse of this way of life.
One of the standout moments that I will remember involved being in the right place at the right time and having my eyes open! A few of us witnessed a white tip shark breach the water and do a jaw dropping horizontal double flip before descending to the waters again. We all just looked at each other and were like 'Woooh, did you fucking see that?'. It was incredible, involved split second timing, blink and you would have missed it.
We took in the following islands: Santa Cruz, Santa Fe, Española and Floreana. The islands were teeming with creatures: sea lions, sally lightfoot crabs, land iguanas, marine iguanas, and gazillions of birds: Waved Albatross, Pelican, American Oyster Catcher, Swallow Tail Gull, and Boobies! (Nazca and Blue Footed). It was a complete assault on the eyes, animals strewn about all over the shop, so much so that you inevitably nearly ended up tripping over iguanas, lava lizards and even sea lions because you just didn't see them. Keeping a 2m distance is very difficult, nigh impossible, in places as the animals just don't seem to have gotten that memo. Plus the birds and animals here are completely unafraid of humans, they stay put when you expect them to scurry for cover at the sound of your footfall, instead they stand their ground and look at you as though to say 'you're a funny looking creature, feck off and don't annoy me'. My poor memory card may have overdosed on the number of sea lion and iguana photos that I took - but everywhere you looked some creature was posing just for you and of course we were all trying to get the ever elusive money shot! I could happily have spent an afternoon watching pelicans and blue footed boobies nose diving into the ocean trying to catch fish - an amazing sight. In fact I did happily spend most of my days gazing at all the creatures. Boo-yea!!!
Post Office Bay on Floreana island contained a wooden barrel that in the past served as a post office so that mail could be picked up and delivered to their destination by ships on their way home. Today postcards are still placed in the barrel without any postage. Visitors sift through the cards in order to deliver them by hand. Sadly there were no postcards for anywhere in Ireland so I didn't get to grab one to potentially deliver, I'm not too confident about my postcard ever making it to its destination - Irish addresses are just too vague, and there doesn't seem to have been any Irish visitors to date. Still a lot from our group took numerous cards to deliver once they get back home. One of Heather's postcards has even made it back to the UK already (it's nearly quicker than actual post).
We wrapped up our time in the Galapagos with a visit to the Charles Darwin centre so that we could see some giant tortoises, and boy are they HUGE! Beautiful creatures and not at all as slow as I had imagined them to be.
I know I've barely touched on my trip here, but this blog post could get rather ridiculous in length if I don't curb my waffle now. And I failed miserably to include just a 'few' sample photos (sorry!). So in a nutshell I saw tons of gorgeous birds and animals, got ridiculously close to most of them, witnessed some amazing sunrises and sunsets. Loved the entire time on the cruise boat, the constant rocking was ultimately very soothing and I enjoyed the peace and quiet of sailing at sea. Need to get me my own boat pronto!! Although I'll totally settle for a return ticket to the Galapagos.
